VipIMAGE 2015 contains invited lectures and full papers presented at VIPIMAGE 2015 - V ECCOMAS Thematic Conference on Computational Vision and Medical Image Processing (Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain, 19-21 October, 2015). International contributions from 19 countries provide a comprehensive coverage of the current state-of-the-art in the fields of: 3D Vision; Computational Bio-Imaging and Visualization; Computational Vision; Computer Aided Diagnosis, Surgery, Therapy and Treatment; Data Interpolation, Registration, Acquisition and Compression; Industrial Inspection; Image Enhancement; Image Processing and Analysis; Image Segmentation; Medical Imaging; Medical Rehabilitation; Physics of Medical Imaging; Shape Reconstruction; Signal Processing; Simulation and Modelling; Software Development for Image Processing and Analysis; Telemedicine Systems and their Applications; Tracking and Analysis of Movement and Deformation; Virtual Reality. Computational Vision and Medical Image Processing. VipIMAGE 2015 will be useful to academics, researchers and professionals in Biomechanics, Biomedical Engineering, Computational Vision (image processing and analysis), Computer Sciences, Computational Mechanics, Signal Processing, Medicine and Rehabilitation.

Fluid simulation is a computer graphic used to develop realistic animation of liquids in modern games. The Art of Fluid Animation describes visually rich techniques for creating fluid-like animations that do not require advanced physics or mathematical skills. It explains how to create fluid animations like water, smoke, fire, and explosions through computer code in a fun manner. The book presents concepts that drive fluid animation and gives a historical background of the computation of fluids. It covers many research areas that include stable fluid simulation, flows on surfaces, and control of flows. It also gives one-paragraph summaries of the material after each section for reinforcement. This book includes computer code that readers can download and run on several platforms so they can extend their work beyond what is described in the book. The material provided here is designed to serve as a starting point for aspiring programmers to begin creating their own programs using fluid animation.

The use of mobile collaborative AR has expended rapidly in recent years, due to the major advances in hardware and networking. The application areas are diverse and multidisciplinary. Recent Trends of Mobile Collaborative Augmented Reality Systems provides a historical overview of previous mobile collaborative AR systems, presents case studies of latest developments in current mobile collaborative AR systems, and latest technologies and system architectures used in this field. Recent Trends of Mobile Collaborative Augmented Reality Systems is designed for a professional audience composed of practitioners and researchers working in the field of augmented reality and human-computer interaction. Advanced-level students in computer science and electrical engineering focused on this topic will also find this book useful as a secondary text or reference.

Transform your images from ordinary to extraordinary in Photoshop Elements Great for non-professional photographers and designers, Adobe's Photoshop Elements is packed with all the photo editing tools you need to turn your images into showstoppers. And with the help of Photoshop Elements 2023 For Dummies, you'll discover the ins and outs of this affordable, beginner-friendly photo editing software. Learn all the tricks for simple, one-click fixes, before leaping into more advanced editing features. Work with layers, brighten colors, add filters, and make your images pop! Learn the basics of Photoshop Elements and quickly improve your photos Enhance color, boost contrast, and sharpen your images Get to know more advanced Photoshop tools like layers Create eye-catching images and improve your designs This book is for you whether you're new to Photoshop Elements or an experienced user needing a refresh on the latest features. You're in good hands with Dummies.

Game design is changing. The emergence of service games on PC, mobile and console has created new expectations amongst consumers and requires new techniques from game makers. In The Pyramid of Game Design, Nicholas Lovell identifies and explains the frameworks and techniques you need to deliver fun, profitable games. Using examples of games ranging from modern free-to-play titles to the earliest arcade games, via PC strategy and traditional boxed titles, Lovell shows how game development has evolved, and provides game makers with the tools to evolve with it. Harness the Base, Retention and Superfan Layers to create a powerful Core Loop. Design the player Session to keep players playing while being respectful of their time. Accept that there are few fixed rules: just trade-offs with consequences. Adopt Agile and Lean techniques to "learn what you need you learn" quickly Use analytics, paired with design skills and player feedback, to improve the fun, engagement and profitability of your games. Adapt your marketing techniques to the reality of the service game era Consider the ethics of game design in a rapidly changing world. Lovell shows how service games require all the skills of product game development, and more. He provides a toolset for game makers of all varieties to create fun, profitable games. Filled with practical advice, memorable anecdotes and a wealth of game knowledge, the Pyramid of Game Design is a must-read for all game developers. Key Features Harness the Base, Retention and Superfan Layers to create a powerful Core Loop. Design the player Session to keep players playing while being respectful of their time. Accept that there are few fixed rules: just trade-offs with consequences. Adopt Agile and Lean techniques to "learn what you need you learn" quickly. Use analytics, paired with design skills and player feedback, to improve the fun, engagement and profitability of your games. Adapt your marketing techniques to the reality of the service game era. Consider the ethics of game design in a rapidly changing world.

Offering the first comprehensive analysis of touchless fingerprint-recognition technologies, Touchless Fingerprint Biometrics gives an overview of the state of the art and describes relevant industrial applications. It also presents new techniques to efficiently and effectively implement advanced solutions based on touchless fingerprinting. The most accurate current biometric technologies in touch-based fingerprint-recognition systems require a relatively high level of user cooperation to acquire samples of the concerned biometric trait. With the potential for reduced constraints, reduced hardware costs, quicker acquisition time, wider usability, and increased user acceptability, this book argues for the potential superiority of touchless biometrics over touch-based methods. The book considers current problems in developing high-accuracy touchless recognition technology. It discusses factors such as shadows, reflections, complex backgrounds, distortions due to perspective effects, uncontrolled finger placement, inconstant resolution of the ridge pattern, and reconstruction and processing of three-dimensional models. The last section suggests what future work can be done to increase accuracy in touchless systems, such as intensive studies on extraction and matching methods and three-dimensional analytical capabilities within systems. In a world where usability and mobility have increasing relevance, Touchless Fingerprint Biometrics demonstrates that touchless technologies are also part of the future. A presentation of the state of the art, it introduces you to the field and its immediate future directions.

Game AI Pro2: Collected Wisdom of Game AI Professionals presents cutting-edge tips, tricks, and techniques for artificial intelligence (AI) in games, drawn from developers of shipped commercial games as well as some of the best-known academics in the field. It contains knowledge, advice, hard-earned wisdom, and insights gathered from across the community of developers and researchers who have devoted themselves to game AI. In this book, 47 expert developers and researchers have come together to bring you their newest advances in game AI, along with twists on proven techniques that have shipped in some of the most successful commercial games of the last few years. The book provides a toolbox of proven techniques that can be applied to many common and not-so-common situations. It is written to be accessible to a broad range of readers. Beginners will find good general coverage of game AI techniques and a number of comprehensive overviews, while intermediate to expert professional game developers will find focused, deeply technical chapters on specific topics of interest to them. Covers a wide range of AI in games, with topics applicable to almost any game Touches on most, if not all, of the topics necessary to get started in game AI Provides real-life case studies of game AI in published commercial games Gives in-depth, technical solutions from some of the industry's best-known games Includes downloadable demos and/or source code, available at http://www.gameaipro.com

While the earliest character representations in video games were rudimentary in terms of their presentation and performance, the virtual characters that appear in games today can be extremely complex and lifelike. These are characters that have the potential to make a powerful and emotional connection with gamers. As virtual characters become more intricate and varied, there is a growing need to examine the theory and practice of virtual character design. This book seeks to develop a series of critical frameworks to support the analysis and design of virtual characters. Virtual Character Design for Games and Interactive Media covers a breadth of topics to establish a relationship between pertinent artistic and scientific theories and good character design practice. Targeted at students, researchers, and professionals, the book aims to show how both character presentation and character performance can be enhanced through careful consideration of underlying theory. The book begins with a focus on virtual character presentation, underpinned by a discussion of biological, artistic, and sociological principles. Next it looks at the performance of virtual characters, encompassing the psychology of emotion and personality, narrative and game design theories, animation, and acting. The book concludes with a series of applied virtual character design examples. These examples examine the aesthetics of player characters, the design and performance of the wider cast of game characters, and the performance of characters within complex, hyperreal worlds.

This book focuses on the fundamentals and recent advances in RGB-D imaging as well as covering a range of RGB-D applications. The topics covered include: data acquisition, data quality assessment, filling holes, 3D reconstruction, SLAM, multiple depth camera systems, segmentation, object detection, salience detection, pose estimation, geometric modelling, fall detection, autonomous driving, motor rehabilitation therapy, people counting and cognitive service robots. The availability of cheap RGB-D sensors has led to an explosion over the last five years in the capture and application of colour plus depth data. The addition of depth data to regular RGB images vastly increases the range of applications, and has resulted in a demand for robust and real-time processing of RGB-D data. There remain many technical challenges, and RGB-D image processing is an ongoing research area. This book covers the full state of the art, and consists of a series of chapters by internationally renowned experts in the field. Each chapter is written so as to provide a detailed overview of that topic. RGB-D Image Analysis and Processing will enable both students and professional developers alike to quickly get up to speed with contemporary techniques, and apply RGB-D imaging in their own projects.

The applications of image-based measurement are many and various: image-guided surgery, mobile-robot navigation, component alignment, part inspection and photogrammetry, among others. In all these applications, landmarks are detected and located in images, and measurements made from those locations.Precision Landmark Location for Machine Vision and Photogrammetry addresses the ubiquitous problem of measurement error associated with determining the location of landmarks in images. With a detailed model of the image formation process and landmark location estimation, the Cramer-Rao Lower Bound (CRLB) theory of statistics is applied to determine the least possible measurement uncertainty in a given situation.This monograph provides the reader with: the most complete treatment to date of precision landmark location and the engineering aspects of image capture and processing; detailed theoretical treatment of the CRLB; a software tool for analyzing the potential performance-specific camera/lens/algorithm configurations; two novel algorithms which achieve precision very close to the CRLB; an experimental method for determining the accuracy of landmark location; and, downloadable MATLAB registered] package to assist the reader with applying theoretically-derived results to practical engineering configurations. All of this adds up to a treatment that is at once theoretically sound and eminently practical.Precision Landmark Location for Machine Vision and Photogrammetry will be of great interest to computer scientists and engineers working with and/or studying image processing and measurement. It includes cutting-edge theoretical developments and practical tools so it will appeal to research investigators and system designers.

A synthesis of more than ten years of experience, Remote Sensing Image Fusion covers methods specifically designed for remote sensing imagery. The authors supply a comprehensive classification system and rigorous mathematical description of advanced and state-of-the-art methods for pansharpening of multispectral images, fusion of hyperspectral and panchromatic images, and fusion of data from heterogeneous sensors such as optical and synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images and integration of thermal and visible/near-infrared images. They also explore new trends of signal/image processing, such as compressive sensing and sparse signal representations. The book brings a new perspective to a multidisciplinary research field that is becoming increasingly articulate and comprehensive. It fosters signal/image processing methodologies toward the goal of information extraction, either by humans or by machines, from remotely sensed images. The authors explain how relatively simple processing methods tailored to the specific features of the images may be winning in terms of reliable performance over more complex algorithms based on mathematical theories and models unconstrained from the physical behaviors of the instruments. Ultimately, the book covers the births and developments of three generations of RS image fusion. Established textbooks are mainly concerned with the earliest generation of methods. This book focuses on second generation methods you can use now and new trends that may become third generation methods. Only the lessons learned with second generation methods will be capable of fostering the excellence among the myriad of methods that are proposed almost every day by the scientific literature.

Obtain the Best Estimate of a Strongly Scattering Object from Limited Scattered Field Data Introduction to Imaging from Scattered Fields presents an overview of the challenging problem of determining information about an object from measurements of the field scattered from that object. It covers widely used approaches to recover information about the objects and examines the assumptions made a priori about the object and the consequences of recovering object information from limited numbers of noisy measurements of the scattered fields. The book explores the strengths and weaknesses of using inverse methods for weak scattering. These methods, including Fourier-based signal and image processing techniques, allow more straightforward inverse algorithms to be exploited based on a simple mapping of scattered field data. The authors also discuss their recent approach based on a nonlinear filtering step in the inverse algorithm. They illustrate how to use this algorithm through numerous two-dimensional electromagnetic scattering examples. MATLAB (R) code is provided to help readers quickly apply the approach to a wide variety of inverse scattering problems. In later chapters of the book, the authors focus on important and often forgotten overarching constraints associated with exploiting inverse scattering algorithms. They explain how the number of degrees of freedom associated with any given scattering experiment can be found and how this allows one to specify a minimum number of data that should be measured. They also describe how the prior discrete Fourier transform (PDFT) algorithm helps in estimating the properties of an object from scattered field measurements. The PDFT restores stability and improves estimates of the object even with severely limited data (provided it is sufficient to meet a criterion based on the number of degrees of freedom). Suitable for graduate students and researchers working on medical, geophysical, defense, and industrial inspection inverse problems, this self-contained book provides the necessary details for readers to design improved experiments and process measured data more effectively. It shows how to obtain the best estimate of a strongly scattering object from limited scattered field data.

Advances in technology have enabled animators and video game designers to design increasingly realistic, human-like characters in animation and games. Although it was intended that this increased realism would allow viewers to appreciate the emotional state of characters, research has shown that audiences often have a negative reaction as the human likeness of a character increases. This phenomenon, known as the Uncanny Valley, has become a benchmark for measuring if a character is believably realistic and authentically human like. This book is an essential guide on how to overcome the Uncanny Valley phenomenon when designing human-like characters in digital applications. In this book, the author provides a synopsis of literature about the Uncanny Valley phenomenon and explains how it was introduced into contemporary thought. She then presents her theories on its possible psychological causes based on a series of empirical studies. The book focuses on how aspects of facial expression and speech can be manipulated to overcome the Uncanny Valley in character design. The Uncanny Valley in Games and Animation presents a novel theory that goes beyond previous research in that the cause of the Uncanny Valley is based on a perceived lack of empathy in a character. This book makes an original, scholarly contribution to our current understanding of the Uncanny Valley phenomenon and fills a gap in the literature by assessing the biological and social roots of the Uncanny Valley and its implications for computer-graphics animation.

Image and video signals require large transmission bandwidth and storage, leading to high costs. The data must be compressed without a loss or with a small loss of quality. Thus, efficient image and video compression algorithms play a significant role in the storage and transmission of data. Image and Video Compression: Fundamentals, Techniques, and Applications explains the major techniques for image and video compression and demonstrates their practical implementation using MATLAB (R) programs. Designed for students, researchers, and practicing engineers, the book presents both basic principles and real practical applications. In an accessible way, the book covers basic schemes for image and video compression, including lossless techniques and wavelet- and vector quantization-based image compression and digital video compression. The MATLAB programs enable readers to gain hands-on experience with the techniques. The authors provide quality metrics used to evaluate the performance of the compression algorithms. They also introduce the modern technique of compressed sensing, which retains the most important part of the signal while it is being sensed.

Expand your imagination by letting go of the limitations of traditional animation mediums, software packages, or workflows and integrating 2D and 3D assets. With the updated and expanded second edition of Hybrid Animation you'll learn how to choose the techniques that best express the artistic and narrative direction of your project and get the technical support you need to bring your ideas to life. Learn how different pipelines of hybrid animation can be broken down and rethought in different packages. Does the 3D character lead a 2D character? Or, does the 2D character have 3D parts? Perhaps a 3D prop is interacting with a 2D character? All of these hybrid patterns are explored from high end to open source software. By the end of the book you'll be able to see how to apply these techniques to the software you have now. Insight and inspiration are at your fingertips with exercises, step-by-step tutorials and featured interviews with Todd Render of Floyd County Productions and Marty Altman, former CGI Technical Director at Walt Disney Feature Animation. Features: Now with updated software methodologies, new tricks, and expanded sections on Toon Boom Animate Pro, Toon Boom Harmony and more. Produce high-quality 2D and 3D narratives in a variety of software workflows, including Photoshop, Corel, Flash, After Effects and Maya, Nuke, Houdini, Smoke, and Toon Boom workflows. Think critically about visual styles, the effects of 2D/3D overlaying and the entire pipeline from start to finish. Explore additional chapters and over 6 gigs of sample files available in the companion data found at www.hybridanimation.com Tina O'Hailey is Dean of Digital Media at the Savannah College of Art and Design with locations in: Atlanta, Savannah and Hong Kong. Having worked for Electronic Arts, Walt Disney Feature Animation, she has extensive experience in feature animation and game development. O'Hailey has served as an Artist Development Trainer for Brother Bear (2003), Lilo and Stitch (2003), Mulan (1998) and Prince of Egypt (1998).

Expand your imagination by letting go of the limitations of traditional animation mediums, software packages, or workflows and integrating 2D and 3D assets. With the updated and expanded second edition of Hybrid Animation you'll learn how to choose the techniques that best express the artistic and narrative direction of your project and get the technical support you need to bring your ideas to life. Learn how different pipelines of hybrid animation can be broken down and rethought in different packages. Does the 3D character lead a 2D character? Or, does the 2D character have 3D parts? Perhaps a 3D prop is interacting with a 2D character? All of these hybrid patterns are explored from high end to open source software. By the end of the book you'll be able to see how to apply these techniques to the software you have now. Insight and inspiration are at your fingertips with exercises, step-by-step tutorials and featured interviews with Todd Render of Floyd County Productions and Marty Altman, former CGI Technical Director at Walt Disney Feature Animation. Features: Now with updated software methodologies, new tricks, and expanded sections on Toon Boom Animate Pro, Toon Boom Harmony and more. Produce high-quality 2D and 3D narratives in a variety of software workflows, including Photoshop, Corel, Flash, After Effects and Maya, Nuke, Houdini, Smoke, and Toon Boom workflows. Think critically about visual styles, the effects of 2D/3D overlaying and the entire pipeline from start to finish. Explore additional chapters and over 6 gigs of sample files available in the companion data found at www.hybridanimation.com Tina O'Hailey is Dean of Digital Media at the Savannah College of Art and Design with locations in: Atlanta, Savannah and Hong Kong. Having worked for Electronic Arts, Walt Disney Feature Animation, she has extensive experience in feature animation and game development. O'Hailey has served as an Artist Development Trainer for Brother Bear (2003), Lilo and Stitch (2003), Mulan (1998) and Prince of Egypt (1998).

This book provides a broad overview of both the technical challenges in sensor network development, and the real-world applications of distributed sensing. Important aspects of distributed computing in large-scale networked sensor systems are analyzed in the context of human behavior understanding, including topics on systems design tools and techniques. Additionally, the book examines a varied range of applications. Features: contains valuable contributions from an international selection of leading experts in the field; presents a high-level introduction to the aims and motivations underpinning distributed sensing; describes decision-making algorithms in the presence of complex sensor networks; provides a detailed analysis of the design, implementation, and development of a distributed network of homogeneous or heterogeneous sensors; reviews the application of distributed sensing to human behavior understanding and autonomous intelligent vehicles; includes a helpful glossary and a list of acronyms.

The award-winning VES Handbook of Visual Effects remains the most complete guide to visual effects techniques and best practices available today. This new edition has been updated to include the latest, industry-standard techniques, technologies, and workflows for the ever-evolving fast paced world of visual effects. The Visual Effects Society (VES) tasked the original authors to update their areas of expertise, such as AR/VR Moviemaking, Color Management, Cameras, VFX Editorial, Stereoscopic and the Digital Intermediate, as well as provide detailed chapters on interactive games and full animation. Additionally, 56 contributors share their best methods, tips, tricks, and shortcuts developed through decades of trial and error and real-world, hands-on experience. This third edition has been expanded to feature lessons on 2.5D/3D Compositing; 3D Scanning; Digital Cinematography; Editorial Workflow in Animated and Visual Effects Features; Gaming updates; General Geometry Instancing; Lens Mapping for VFX; Native Stereo; Real-Time VFX and Camera Tracking; Shot/Element Pulls and Delivery to VFX; Techvis; VFX Elements and Stereo; Virtual Production; and VR/AR (Virtual Reality / Augmented Reality). A must-have for anyone working in or aspiring to work in visual effects, The VES Handbook of Visual Effects, Third Edition covers essential techniques and solutions for all VFX artists, producers, and supervisors, from pre-production to digital character creation, compositing of both live-action and CG elements, photorealistic techniques, and much more. With subjects and techniques clearly and definitively presented in beautiful four-color, this handbook is a vital resource for any serious VFX artist.

Tackle the Challenges of Parallel Programming in the Visual Effects Industry In Multithreading for Visual Effects, developers from DreamWorks Animation, Pixar, Side Effects, Intel, and AMD share their successes and failures in the messy real-world application area of production software. They provide practical advice on multithreading techniques and visual effects used in popular visual effects libraries (such as Bullet, OpenVDB, and OpenSubdiv), one of the industry's leading visual effects packages (Houdini), and proprietary animation systems. This information is valuable not just to those in the visual effects arena, but also to developers of high performance software looking to increase performance of their code. Diverse Solutions to Solve Performance Problems After an introductory chapter, each subsequent chapter presents a case study that illustrates how the authors used multithreading techniques to achieve better performance. The authors discuss the problems that occurred and explain how they solved them. The case studies encompass solutions for shaving milliseconds, solutions for optimizing longer running tasks, multithreading techniques for modern CPU architectures, and massive parallelism using GPUs. Some of the case studies include open source projects so you can try out these techniques for yourself and see how well they work.

A rare look at the role of special effects in creating fictional worlds and transmedia franchises From comic book universes crowded with soaring superheroes and shattering skyscrapers to cosmic empires set in far-off galaxies, today's fantasy blockbusters depend on visual effects. Bringing science fiction from the studio to your screen, through film, television, or video games, these special effects power our entertainment industry. More Than Meets the Eye delves into the world of fantastic media franchises to trace the ways in which special effects over the last 50 years have become central not just to transmedia storytelling but to worldbuilding, performance, and genre in contemporary blockbuster entertainment. More Than Meets the Eye maps the ways in which special effects build consistent storyworlds and transform genres while traveling from one media platform to the next. Examining high-profile franchises in which special effects have played a constitutive role such as Star Trek, Star Wars, The Matrix, and The Lord of the Rings, as well as more contemporary franchises like Pirates of the Caribbean and Harry Potter, Bob Rehak analyzes the ways in which production practices developed alongside the cultural work of industry professionals. By studying social and cultural factors such as fan interaction, this book provides a context for understanding just how much multiplatform storytelling has come to define these megahit franchises. More Than Meets the Eye explores the larger history of how physical and optical effects in postwar Hollywood laid the foundation for modern transmedia franchises and argues that special effects are not simply an adjunct to blockbuster filmmaking, but central agents of an entire mode of production.

While some rigging books focus too much on the theory of rigging and provide little instruction, others do the exact opposite and offer no reasoning behind the button-pushing. An Essential Introduction to Maya Character Rigging, 2nd Edition, however, offers a perfect balance. Cheryl Briggs' text is built for the classroom, with step-by-step tutorials that guide the reader through the rigging process. With vibrant screenshots and a plethora of helpful tips, this book provides a strong foundation in character rigging for anyone who wants to pursue 3D animation or more advanced rigging topics. Features Provides readers with fundamental techniques to give them a firm grasp on Maya character rigging. Thorough step-by-step tutorials, which provides instruction on how to create biped, quadruped, and prop rigs. Continuous updates and further support can be located at www.cherylcreates.com Cheryl Briggs (formerly Cabrera) is an award-winning animated short film director. She has advised and guided aspiring animators, game artists, and visual effects artists for 20 years. Since 2009, Cheryl has taught all aspects of production in the Character Animation specialization in the School of Visual Arts and Design at the University of Central Florida. She also taught as Professor of Animation at the Savannah College of Art and Design from 2001 to 2009. Cheryl is currently on the Board of Directors for the Animation Hall of Fame. She also is a member of the Special Interest Group on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques (SIGGRAPH), the International Animated Film Society (ASIFA-Hollywood), Women in Animation, Women in Film and Television, and the Society for Animation Studies. Cheryl is also an Autodesk Certified Professional and an Autodesk Certified Instructor in Maya. She is the author of An Essential Introduction to Maya Character Rigging (Focal Press, 2008), Reel Success: Creating Demo Reels and Animation Portfolios (Focal Press, 2013), and Animating Short Stories: Narrative Techniques and Visual Design (Bloomsbury Academic, 2019). Cheryl holds a B.A. and M.Ed. in Education and an M.F.A. in Computer Art with a specialization in 3D Animation. She is a digital artist and animator that blends the lines between digital imagery and the traditional painting medium. She has participated is numerous group and solo exhibitions in the United States and her work is featured in several private collections. Her award-winning students have been featured in animation festivals worldwide, and many have gone on to work within the entertainment industry.

Biomedical / Electrical Engineering Nonlinear Biomedical Signal Processing Volume II: Dynamic Analysis and Modeling A volume in the IEEE Press Series on Biomedical Engineering Metin Akay, Series Editor Featuring current contributions by experts in signal processing and biomedical engineering, this book introduces the concepts, recent advances, and implementations of nonlinear dynamic analysis methods. Together with Volume I in this series, this book provides comprehensive coverage of nonlinear signal and image processing techniques. Nonlinear Biomedical Signal Processing: Volume II combines analytical and biological expertise in the original mathematical simulation and modeling of physiological systems. Detailed discussions of the analysis of steady-state and dynamic systems, discrete-time system theory, and discrete modeling of continuous-time systems are provided. Biomedical examples include the analysis of the respiratory control system, the dynamics of cardiac muscle and the cardiorespiratory function, and neural firing patterns in auditory and vision systems. Examples include relevant MATLAB(r) and Pascal programs. Topics covered include:
* Nonlinear dynamics
* Behavior and estimation
* Modeling of biomedical signals and systems
* Heart rate variability measures, models, and signal assessments
* Origin of chaos in cardiovascular and gastric myoelectrical activity
* Measurement of spatio-temporal dynamics of human epileptic seizures.
A valuable reference book for medical researchers, medical faculty, and advanced graduate students, it is also essential reading for practicing biomedical engineers. Nonlinear Biomedical Signal Processing, Volume II is anexcellent companion to Dr. Akay's Nonlinear Biomedical Signal Processing, Volume I: Fuzzy Logic, Neural Networks, and New Algorithms.

The subject of digital image processing has migrated from a graduate to a junior or senior level course as students become more proficient in mathematical background earlier in their college education. With that in mind, Introduction to Digital Image Processing is simpler in terms of mathematical derivations and eliminates derivations of advanced subjects. Most importantly, the textbook contains an extensive set of programming exercises for students.
The textbook examines the basic technologies needed to support image processing applications, including the characterization of continuous images, image sampling and quantization techniques, and two-dimensional signal processing techniques. It then covers the two principle areas of image processing: image enhancement and restoration techniques and extraction of information from an image. It concludes with discussions of image and video compression.

• Covers the mathematical representation of continuous images and discrete images
• Discusses the psychophysical properties of human vision
• Analyzes and compares linear processing techniques implemented by direct convolution and Fourier domain filtering
• Details restoration models, point and spatial restoration and geometrical image modification
• Includes morphological image processing, edge detection, image feature extraction, image segmentation, object shape analysis, and object detection
• Describes coding technique applicable to still image and video coding based upon point and spatial processing
• Outlines the widely adopted JPEG and MPEG still image and video coding standards

The author s accessible style provides historical background on the development of image processing techniques as well as a theoretical exposition. The inclusion of numerous exercises fully prepares students for further study."

RUNS, JUMPS AND SKIPS From Richard Williams' The Animator's Survival Kit comes key chapters in mini form. The Animator's Survival Kit is the essential tool for animators. However, sometimes you don't want to carry the hefty expanded edition around with you to your college or studio if you're working on just one aspect of it that day. The Animation Minis take some of the most essential chapters and make them available in smaller, lightweight, hand-bag/backpack size versions. Easy to carry. Easy to study. This Mini focuses on Runs, Jumps and Skips. As with Walks, the way we run shows our character and personality. A lazy, heavy person is going to run very differently to an athletic ten-year-old girl. Richard Williams demonstrates how - when you're doing a walk and you take both legs off the ground, at the same time and for just one frame - a walk becomes a run. So, all the things we do with walks, we can do with runs. This Mini presents a collection of Williams' runs, jumps and skips inspired by some of the cleverest artists from the Golden Age of Animation